This scramble marked the end of the second period of a semi-finals match between two wrestlers ranked in the top 10 nationally by InterMat Wrestling.

Bryce Brill (Mt. Carmel – Chicago, IL) takes a bad shot from left field on Jake Short (Simley, MN) and appears to give up a takedown at the end of the second period of this Cheesehead Wrestling tournament semi-final match.

However, when the dust settled, no points were awarded.

While I believe this match was well officiated from start to finish, I believe an error was made when it comes to this non-call at the end of the second period.  Once Short was able to work back on top and control Brill’s hips prior to the buzzer, a takedown should have been awarded.  The fact that Brill was still attempting to counter, first with the body lock then with a body whizzer/knee block, is of no consequence. There are three different illustrations in the 2011-2012 NFHS Rule Book that illustrate this point:

In my opinion there is not much difference between any of the illustrations above and the position that Brill and Short ended up in at the buzzer. I seems to be a pretty clear takedown to me. Let’s look at the rule referenced in all of the illustrations above:

I believe all of the criteria laid out in 5-25-1 have been met.

Brill and Short started in the neutral position at the beginning of the scramble.  Short ultimately gained control over Brill’s down on the mat.  The supporting points of at least one wrestler were inbounds when control was gained.

That said, reasonable people can disagree on a call this close.

Since there is no way to codify what constitutes “control” in all positions and situations, often times control must be “felt” by the calling official. The NFHS Wrestling publications state several times that “control is felt rather than observed”. In scramble situations such as these it can be difficult to get a feel for when control has been obtained.  I’m sure that’s what lead to a no-call in this case.

The 2011-2012 NFHS Wrestling Manual also attempts to highlight how important “feel” is when it comes to the awarding of points.  It also offers some guidelines to assist in making determinations of whether or not control has been obtained/maintained:

The second paragraph contains a hidden gem that when applied to this scramble would have helped the official to get to what I believe would have been the correct call: ”(i)n a double leg, when the countering wrestler is seated on the mat, a takedown can be awarded as soon as this wrestler is no longer able to use the legs as a means of support”.

If you haven’t already, check out the full match.

It’s a treat. You’ll see two of the nations top young wrestlers going at it in a well officiated match at one of the top prep tournaments in the country.

Quite a bit going on during this play (courtesy of some ill-advised Tim Tebow improvisation). Best wishes for a speedy recovery, Danny McCray.

The officials did a great job of staying on top of the action and flagging the infractions that needed to be flagged according to NFL rules. In no particular order, the fouls by offense were an illegal forward pass (0:17), an ineligible receiver down field (0:17) and an illegal block in the back (0:19).

Terry McAulay did a good job of announcing the fouls with the help of his off-camera crew mates (young officials take note).

Plays like this can unfortunately give lower level officials fits. Those fits will have nothing to do with covering the action, though. This play does a great job of highlighting a couple of the rule differences between the National Football League (NFL) and National Federation of State High School Association (NFHS) rule sets.

If this play were to occur on any given Friday night in a high school game played under NFHS rules, there is a high probability that there will only be 5 guys in the stadium that know the differences between the codes and how to properly apply them. However, people in attendance will be convinced that the officials don’t know what they’re doing when the dust settles and there is (hopefully) only one flag on the ground. There will be cries of “homerism”, incompetence, and much much worse.

There’s no escaping the uninformed, though; ignoring them is just part of the job.

So without further ado, let’s dissect the various fouls that were called on this play and discuss the NFHS rules apply to the action on the field.

Illegal Forward Pass

Surprisingly, Tim Tebow’s (#15) pass would have been a legal forward pass according the NFHS rules.  NFHS Rule 7-5-1 defines a legal forward pass:

It is a legal forward pass, if during a scrimmage down and before team possession has changed, a player of A throws the ball with both feet of the passer in or behind the neutral zone when the ball is released. Only one forward pass may be thrown during a down.

Under NFHS rules, the only restriction is that the passers feet must both be in or behind the neutral zone when the ball is released.  There is no restriction on crossing the neutral zone and returning behind it to throw a legal forward pass.

Ineligible Downfield

If this game were being played under NFHS rules, Manny Rameriez (#65) would have been legally downfield.  NFHS Rule 7-5-12 discusses ineligible players illegally down field:

Ineligible A players may not advance beyond the expanded neutral zone on a legal forward pass play before a legal forward pass that crosses the neutral zone is in flight.

While this was a legal forward pass under NFHS rules, it did not cross the neutral zone in flight.  The ball was snapped at the 14 and the receiver caught the ball two yards behind the line of scrimmage at the 16.  In this case, there simply would not have been any restrictions on team A’s ineligibles.

Illegal Block in the Back

The block by Julius Thomas (#80) was simply illegal in all rule sets.  Rule 9-3-5 discusses clipping and illegal blocking in the back:

A player shall not clip or block an opponent in the back except:

a. In the free blocking zone when the contact meets the requirements of 2-17
b. Using hands and arms to contact an opponent above the waist in warding off a blocker, or when attempting to reach a runner, or catch or recover a loose ball which he may legally touch or possess.
c. To tackle a runner of player

This call was a “no brainer” at any level.  Mr. Thomas should know better.

I have a feeling that this would have been called a third way in a National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) game, but don’t presently have time to parse that rule set.  We’ll leave that analysis for another day.

It seems the slam call at about 1:10 of the video above has a few of the fine citizens of Kansas in a tizzy. A sampling of the comments on the Kansas Wrestling talk forums includes the following gems: “what a joke”, “(t)hat was embarrassing” and “(f)urther evidence of the pussification of America“.  The last one is my personal favorite, but I digress. The discourse goes downhill from there.  There’s talk of “no accountability”, “circling in the wagons” and other nonsense.  I love the mob mentality of most internet message boards.

Personally, I think the slam call was a no brainer.

I haven’t found a single official that disagrees with the call.  The closest I’ve gotten is a single official that isn’t sure that he would have called it, but thinks he probably would have.  The officials on the NFHS wrestling forum are unanimous (which almost never happens) with comments like: “(h)eck yeah, “(a)bsolutely”, “without question” and “for sure”.

While the high amplitude mule kick prior to the lift would have piqued my interest, it was not a component in arriving at the slam call.  The key component of that part of the action is that the offensive wrestler did, in fact, lift his opponent.  The potential for a slam call exists.

Did he return his opponent with unnecessary force?

Of course, he did. The wrestler left his feet adding to the downward force of his opponent and then positioned himself to drive his shoulder through his opponents check upon impact.

Had he kept his left foot on the ground… it would probably have been a different story.

The NFHS Soccer Rules Committee has thankfully (finally?) reduced the number of official signals from a mind numbing 23 down to 8, effective with the 2010-2011 season. The eight remaining signals are the signals that were most commonly used by officials at all levels of play. These signals include starting the clock, time out, direct free kick, indirect free kick, play on, penalty kick/goal kick, caution/ejection & corner kick.

I couldn’t be happier with the change.

While some may disagree, I believe the old signal chart was simply over-communication.

If people are watching the game, shouldn’t they already know that a direct free kick was awarded for tripping rather than pushing? That an indirect free kick was awarded for offsides rather than dangerous play? Is it really a big deal if someone doesn’t know whether a direct free kick was awarded for pushing or striking? Was there some sort of confusion as to when the ball was dead?

For those keeping track, here are the old signal charts:

It has been more than a year since the NFHS, in an effort to quash rolling starts, mandated a new starting sequence be followed when assuming the offensive starting position.  More than a year seems like more than enough time for wrestlers, coaches, and officials to have adjusted to the change.

It took all of 30 seconds on YouTube to find the following video (45 second mark):

While this particular video was posted last year, I still see wrestlers doing this every week.

The offensive wrestler in the video sets his knee and foot, places his head on his opponent’s back, reaches around his opponent’s belly and attempts to place his hand over his opponent’s navel, places the near hand on his opponent’s elbow, becomes stationary, and waits for the whistle.  Instead of waiting for the whistle, he should have been receiving his first caution.

The starting sequence found in 5-20-5 NOTE can be summed up as follows: knees, navel, head, elbow, pause, whistle.

1. set the knee(s) and feet;
2. place the palm of one hand on the opponent’s navel;
3. place the head on or above the mid-line of the opponent’s back;
4. place the palm of the other hand on or over the back of the opponent’s near elbow;
5. both wrestlers shall become stationary; and
6. the referee shall pause momentarily before starting wrestling.

I know that we all make decisions every match about what to caution and what to correct on restarts.  After all, we could be there all night. In the aforementioned video without looking too closely, there could have been at least three cautions on the first restart. While I’m not advocating nitpicking, I don’t think it’s too much to ask that we all know the rule.

Unfortunately, that’s not been my experience.